Animals, including, but not limited to, companion animals, livestock, laboratory animals, working animals, and sport animals, generate odors that most people find offensive, especially when the odors are strong. For animals kept outdoors, this can lead to problems with neighbors, staff that work with the animals, and owners of the animals. Odors from animals kept indoors can aggravate the animal's owners, those living in the same household of the indoor animal, and visitors to the household where the animal is kept.
Ammonia and other odors coming from farms, such as horse farms, can aggravate neighbors, especially in residential areas. The ability to effectively control and alleviate waste odors associated with equine in urban areas provides a healthier living environment and helps horse enthusiasts to maintain good relationships with their neighbors.
Ammonia negatively affects the health of stabled horses worldwide. Even long-term, low level exposure to ammonia can affect a horse's respiratory health and immune response. (Davis, M. S. Foster, W. M. “Inhalation Toxicology in the Equine Respiratory Tract.” In: Equine Respiratory Disease, P. Lekeus. International Veterinary Information Service, 2002). Horse bedding consists of materials such as straw, sand and other material. Wood shavings are commonly used as bedding material to help absorb urine and provide a surface for easy clean up. The condition or quality of bedding in equine stalls can be affected by a number of factors including frequency of clean-out, ventilation, moisture and temperature. Due to the health problems associated with high levels of ammonia, proper barn management is crucial. Daily cleaning, good ventilation and complete clean-out of stalls when bedding is too soiled are essential to control ammonia exposure. Due to the cost of bedding materials, most horse owners clean stalls daily but prefer not to strip stalls on a regular basis. There is great value in extending the bedding life and the amount of time that bedding remains in the stall. By reducing the ammonia odors in the bedding, bedding life can be extended, resulting in a great cost savings.
There are more horses in the United States currently than there were in the 1800's, many of them kept in urban areas. In this setting, the manure and urine from horses can be offensive to non-horse owners and can be a problem for municipal landfills. Ammonia production can also cause performance loss in competitive horse events like horse racing.
Some products to treat horse waste material are available, but most are chemically based and only provide short term relief of odors and no increased digestion of solid waste. Some products control ammonia with absorbents, such as clay and zeolite. These products function by providing negatively charged exchange sites to attract ammonium ions. In this process, more weakly bound ions such as hydrogen and sodium are replaced by ammonium ions, reduction the total concentration of ammonia in solution. These products also bind water, reducing the microbial activity and therefore the breakdown of urea to ammonia. Other products control ammonia via yucca additives and fragrances that simply mask the odor. Ammonia negatively affects the health of caged small animal pets as well.
Guinea pigs, hamsters, rats and other small animals need soft clean bedding that is changed frequently in order for the animal to stay in top health. Bedding is replaced to keep down ammonia, and to keep small animals and the cage clean. Ammonia is a component of urine. In high concentrations not only does it smell offensive to humans, but it can eventually lead to respiratory problems for the small animals. Breathing concentrated ammonia will damage their lungs, burn their esophagus and create other health problems. Therefore, reducing ammonia levels is important for small animals. There is also a great value and need in extending bedding life.
Ammonia concentrations in poorly ventilated horse barns and cages can rise to levels potentially harmful to the equine and small animal respiratory tract. High levels of ammonia have been associated with foal pneumonia (McMillan K: Foal pneumonia: An Illinois survey. An Health and Nutrit 1986; 34). High levels of ammonia may also predispose horses to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. (Tanner M K, Swinker A M, Traub-Dargatz J L, Stiffler L A, McCue P M, Vanderwall D K, Johnson K E: Respiratory and environmental effects of recycled phone book paper versus sawdust as bedding for horses. J Eq Vet Sci 1998; 468-476). Ammonia and odor smells coming from horse farms can aggravate neighbors, especially in residential areas.
The ammonia present in equine facilities and small animal cages is the product of microbial decomposition of excreted nitrogenous compounds. This includes urea, nonabsorbed proteins, amino acids, and nonprotein nitrogen present in the diet.
In view of the foregoing, it would be desirable to provide one or more Bacillus strains to treat or prevent animal odors and to provide animal bedding including one or more of these strains, methods of using the Bacillus strains and animal bedding treated with the Bacillus strains.